Extra Puzzle Pieces
by SJlikeslists
Summary: This collection contains one shots that probably ought to be parts of longer stories but are not.
1. Notes from Nowhere

Disclaimer: _Harry Potter_ is not mine.

Will it be worth it?

It could have been a question about anything, but the only thought that flashes through Peter's head is that someone knows. He had been so cautious, but it had done him no good. Who is it? Who have they told? His head is a cacophony of swirling panic. He's been caught. They'll kill him. Somehow, he can't quite clear his thoughts enough to determine who the "they" in that thought is. It could be either - quite frankly, it could be both. His position is so tenuous that he literally has no safe haven. There is no trust - not for him, not anymore. He can remember what seems a lifetime of stress and worry ago what it was like to be secure in the knowledge of there being someone (several someone's to be precise) that had his back (even in ill-advised and poorly reasoned endeavors). He gave that up in favor of a deal to save his own hide. There had been a whole list of personal justifications at the time, but he knew that it boiled down to fear. He had no wish to die for a cause. Such a fate held no appeal for him - no matter what those who would name themselves his friends would say in contrast. They were all a flutter about right and wrong and personal responsibility and a dozen other comments that Peter found little more than trite nothings to try to talk yourself into believing that there was something noble about lacking any sense of self-preservation. He couldn't wrap his head around it. There was no point in martyrdom. He wanted his life - miserable as it had become.

He had been swept up in joining them in their Order because the four of them had always done things together. Maybe it had been that way for too long. They hadn't even asked him. Here they were all set to risk their lives - to die in what would likely be painful and unpleasantly creative ways. They had never even asked him if being a part of it was something that he wanted.

What sort of friends were they really if the thought to ask him what he wanted had never occurred to any of them?

That was the question he held to on the nights that he couldn't sleep while he thought over the words he had slipped in to a conversation with Sirius that pushed the other man's thoughts in the direction of mistrusting Remus. Sirius was easily worked on with his volatile temperament and tendency to act first and do his thinking through later. Remus was easily scapegoated. He held too much inside - too unwilling to let others in on things which he felt he should handle on his own. As long as he kept his comments suitably subtle, then his balance was maintained. No one turned suspicious eyes in his direction. He lived another day at the cost of the slow deterioration of the bonds between his friends and brothers. Everything in life had a cost. One just decided which things were worth paying.

He had been certain when it all began that his life was worth what he had arranged to offer in return for it. He had told himself that it still was with each new level that shifted into place within the scope of his "deal." He had reminded himself in the face of the blankness that settled over him in the moments after he had settled within himself to commit to another course of action that could only be termed a further betrayal.

He sank further back into the chair and found his fingers crumpling the parchment he was clutching. He was sure there was somewhere he was supposed to be; there was always somewhere he was supposed to be. There was always something he was supposed to be doing. There was always someone he was supposed to be ensuring had no reason to doubt his loyalty and dedication. That was his life now.

Was it worth it?

Living was all he had counted on securing out of this situation. Living, he thought, was likely shortly all he would have left. He could make do with that.

Or could he?

When has Remus ever not been loyal?

Sirius stares at the slip of parchment in front of him and tries to figure out what he should be thinking first. He has already worried about threats. Mysterious messages are not supposed to materialize out of thin air directly in front of you - not even in the wizarding world. There are wards and whatnot designed to keep nefarious things on the outside (because one ought to be able to relax just a little bit within the confines of one's own home), but the message is still resting in the palm of his hand. It is not an Order message. It is no form of communication with which he is familiar (which means no clues as to whom it could be from).

He is half inclined to think that it is from James given the somewhat stilted note upon which their last conversation came to an end. The other half of his inclinations remind him that this is absolutely not James's style. James will make his points all over again the next time that they see each other privately in person. Then, he will tell him that he doesn't want to hear anything else on the subject and declare the matter closed. Sirius will, of course, ignore that dictatorial bent but bide his time for an opportune moment to once again point out the fact that the circumstances fit. It is not as if he wants to be right about this. It isn't as though he likes being responsible for that look appearing on his best friend - his brother's - face.

He doesn't want Remus to be a traitor. He doesn't want Remus to be in a position of suspicion. He doesn't like any of this. He didn't go out looking for reasons to push another one of his brother's out of their circle of trust. Facts are simply facts. Remus is acting oddly (even by Remus definitions of the word). Someone is leaking out information. James and Lily are at risk. Harry is at risk. It doesn't matter how much the conversations pain James. He would never forgive him if something slipped their notice and his son got hurt in the process. Sirius would never forgive himself.

He wasn't going to ignore the signs just because it made all of their lives uncomfortable. They had to get to the bottom of this. He wasn't about to go marching up and accuse Remus to his face without more evidence to hand, but there was no purpose in taking further chances. It was easy enough to cut him out of pertinent conversations. If the leaks continued over matters that Remus had no means of being privy to, then he would be the first in line to reopen their lines of communication - even stumble out something that might cursorily resemble an apology if James insists that it is necessary to pull everything out into the open. He would argue that there would be no reason to upset their friend over nothing if it turns out that he hasn't done anything wrong. They can just forget that the topic ever happened as far as he is concerned.

No one will be happier than he to have it all turn out to be nothing - except that nothing isn't a possibility. Someone is leaking information. Someone is putting his brother's family in danger. He has to find out who it is. He has to put a stop to it. It has to be done, and everyone else is too busy looking for surety and blinded by ties to look at things from a rational and logical perspective (and isn't it ironic that he is the one that is advocating for logic and clear thinking over emotions and bonds). As long as James and his family are safe, then he will live with whatever he needs to do to ensure that that safety continues.

That does not stop the words from taunting him.

When has Remus ever not been loyal?

He crumples up the parchment in his hands and rests his head against his knees, but he can still see the words as clearly as if he was still staring at them. He doesn't have an answer to that question that doesn't consist of the word "never."


	2. Prompt Bingo

Disclaimer: _Harry Potter_ is not mine.

Don't mind me; I'm just playing Prompt Bingo. My five words are buddies, magnified, dome, great, and jingling.

* * *

"I need for you to tell me the truth, mate." Ron blurted out drumming his fingers against the top of his leg as if he was desperate to be doing anything other than looking Harry in the eyes as he made the request.

"That sounds ominous," his friend commented. Ron did not reply. He shifted his eyes up and to the side where Ginny was sitting before looking back down at his still drumming fingers.

"What?" Harry's wife scoffed at her brother. "I thought we got beyond the get lost, Ginny, I'm talking to my buddies phase a couple of decades ago." The man in question didn't say anything. He just briefly looked up at her and shrugged his shoulders. "Fine," Ginny told him as she got up from the table. "You do know he's just going to tell me later?" She added over her shoulder as she went through the door.

Ron sighed and snuck one more brief look as he tried to figure out if there was any way to lead in to the subject. Looking up didn't help - he wasn't quite used to the way the stronger lenses in the new glasses magnified Harry's eyes yet. It made him look weird. He wasn't in the completely over the top territory of their former divination teacher yet, but it still felt like his friend's face was disproportional every time he glanced at him.

"Am I getting fat?"

"What?"

"Don't make me ask again, Harry. You heard me." Ron sighed and switched from drumming his fingers to picking at a thread that was loose at the base of his sweater. "It's just . . . we were sending Hugo off to Hogwart's the other week and there was Malfoy sporting that bare all up front dome of his standing at the station again. I was snickering about it on the way home when I realized that maybe he's not the only one that is starting to look a little off."

"We are getting older," Harry replied sounding as if he would rather be having a thousand other conversations over the one that they were having.

"I don't know if I'm ready for that," Ron admitted sounding something like defeated.

"Can't you . . . I don't know . . . talk to Hermione about this?" Harry tried.

"Yeah . . . that's a stellar idea," Ron mocked. "Hey, dear, would you care to list all the ways that you no longer find me attractive?" He snorted and tugged so hard at the loose thread that it pulled completely off of the hem.

"Let's play Quidditch," Harry demanded suddenly after a lengthy pause.

"What?"

"This is awkward," Harry insisted. "Let's just go fly. When was the last time that we played some one on one?"

"That is a great idea," Ron smiled. "Brilliant even."

Ron and Harry enjoyed their afternoon, but questions lingered all around.

"Did the two of you have a good afternoon with your pickup game?"

"Yeah. It was nice."

"I'm sure it was. It's been a long time since any of us have played."

"Yeah."

"I can't even remember the last time we all played together."

Harry looked at his wife consideringly as she worked on straightening up the kitchen rather than looking at him. Was she hinting?

"Are you mad that we didn't invite you to play?"

"Don't be silly, Harry. I certainly don't care if my husband and brother shunt me out of the room for secretive conversations and then go off to play games without even bothering to mention it."

"Uh-huh."

"What did my brother want?"

He considered answering her. Then, he pictured word getting around. He could practically hear the tone of George's voice for the next hundred or so family gatherings as he demanded an opinion on whether or not his outfit was making his waistline look thick. He (and Ron) would never hear the end of it. He had been through enough awkwardness already for the day - he wasn't about to open himself up for more. He just shook his head at her in response. He was actually too busy being accosted by a sudden thought that he didn't notice her frown at his refusal to share.

"Gin . . . do you think these new glasses make me look too old?"

"What are you on about?" She questioned. "Wait. Is my brother having a midlife crisis? Is it catching?" She teased.

"Could we focus?"

"On that ridiculous question?" She reached over and took his hand and drew him to sit down in one of the chairs before plopping into his lap. "I married a man with the most stunning green eyes, Harry." She told him leaning in close. "It was my great good luck that he also suffers from truly terrible nearsightedness - which means that said stunning green eyes are nearly always wonderfully set off by a pair of frames." She leaned even closer and gave him a quick kiss.

"So . . . that means you don't have a problem with the glasses?"

"Harry James Potter! I was practically waxing poetic there."

"Sorry," he muttered before going quiet.

"What?" She asked. "What are you thinking? And it better not be anything regarding that strand of grey we found in my hair last week because you know good and well that your eldest . . . ."

He cut her off with a quick kiss of his own.

"I was just thinking that I am a very lucky man."

"Good then. We're both on the same page." She sighed. "We are, however, going to need to discuss what James' punishment for sneaking that tonic of George's into our bathroom is going to be when he gets home."

"We could do that."

"Or?"

"Or you could challenge me to a game of Quidditch."

"Are you sure you aren't too old to handle two games in one day?"

"I think I'll manage."

Ron's uncertainty hadn't been alleviated by the game either (although he had come home in an excellent mood on the day of). Eight days in a row of turning down pudding after dinner left his wife confused, concerned, then exasperated as a shrug was the only response she continued to receive to her inquiries.

"Ron Weasley!" She finally snapped after she had made an extra effort of coming home early to make what she knew was one of his favorites in an attempt to help him shake off whatever was bothering him only to have him brush off the dish with a wave of his hand. "What has gotten into you?

The look on her husband's face set her nerves on edge. She knew that look. Something was very wrong. She slid into the seat next to him and reached out for his hand bracing for him to tell her something awful (twenty three different scenarios ran through her head in the time it took her to wrap her fingers around his). He wouldn't even look at her. She felt her breath catching in her throat.

"I'm giving up dessert," he told her solemnly. She waited for a few beats sure that something else was coming. When nothing did, she looked at him in confusion.

"You're giving up dessert," she repeated feeling like she must be missing something. Her shoulders were still tensed from the expectation of being told something potentially devastating.

"I just don't want to be a set of jingling bells away from being mistaken for Father Christmas by children on the street."

"I don't think that's going to be a problem," Hermione told him doing her best not to laugh.

"Easy for you to say - you had two children and if anything look better than the day I married you," he insisted.

"Biased viewing perspective right there," she muttered under her breath.

"Huh?"

"I have lines on my forehead," she told him matter of factly.

"Huh? What lines?"

"I don't know whether to roll my eyes at you or kiss you for that one," she admitted fondly.

"Do I get a vote?"

"Us getting older is rather inevitable," she ignored his question.

"Didn't always feel that way," he muttered squeezing her fingers. She squeezed back knowing exactly what he meant. They hadn't always been sure that they were going to live long enough to be adults - let alone aging ones. "I'm glad though," he added after a moment. "That we get to get older - us together." She smiled at him and leaned in closer.

"Are you still giving up dessert?" She whispered.

"Maybe every other day," he decided tugging her in closer whispering in turn. "You know something, wife of mine?"

"What?"

"I don't think we've been taking adequate advantage of the children being off at school."


	3. A Different Hermione

Disclaimer: _Harry Potter_ does not belong to me.

The Grangers had known right away that they had brought themselves home a curious infant and were unsurprised when she grew into an even more curious toddler. They answered her demands of "why" as best they could and smiled at each other over the top of her head when that morphed, instead, into a demand of "how." The telephone, the toaster, and the thermostat as well as every other item with the option of "on" or "off" to its name were treated in a similar fashion. Their little girl wanted to know and understand everything which she encountered.

People interested her even more than things and strangers (be they in line at the grocery store or sitting near her in the pediatrician's office) were only people whom she had not yet asked questions. She learned to read early, and they read books and sections of the encyclopedia together when something in one of the books was found to require further explanation. The Grangers thought it was adorable and were quite proud of their daughter's fascination (and wide eyed wonder) with discovery. Thus, they all tripped happily along through her early childhood.

All of that came to an end within the first six weeks of Hermione starting school. The Grangers were unprepared for their bright, inquisitive, friendly child not to function well in school. They had expected her to be happy there. Instead, they were troubled to find her growing more withdrawn and less open to the people she encountered by the day. By the time they convinced her to confide in them, the damage was already done. Hermione Granger had learned to value being invisible to people outside of her immediate family as nothing short of a survival skill, and she would cling to that goal with every bit of tenacity that she possessed for the next six years of her life.

Then, there came the invitation and visit that would change her family's entire view of what was and was not real in the world.

She had had brief thoughts that maybe things would be different when her invitation (and the attendant explanations) had first arrived. She did not entertain those thoughts for long. She would watch and wait, but she would not get her hopes up that anything significant might change. Her beliefs were only reinforced as she watched and listened to the other children on the train and at the sorting feast. Children were children whether they were wizarding children or not, and they had an inherent knack for being hateful to each other. She kept to the same strategy of carefully perpetuated invisibility that had gotten her through her primary years.

She ducked her head when the teachers asked a question and no one else raised their hand to answer. She knew, of course, she always knew, but she knew better than to ever let that fact come to the attention of her peers. She had had enough mocking to last her a lifetime already. Avoiding it was the only way that she knew how to function. She clung to that method of coping despite its shortcomings.

It wasn't as though her policy of silence was winning her anything in the realm of friendships (it never had). She spent so much time carefully guarding her tongue that her responses to any overtures of others were always succinct and closed ended (as well as scrupulously polite). They wrote her off as quiet and self-contained, and they left her mostly alone. She thought that that was the best that she was going to be able to ask for out of her school years. She, at the very least, had no one with a knowledge of her early blundering through the world of standardized education around to make waves in the solitary but unhindered life she was making for herself (children also had long memories).

She wrote long letters home filled with all of the things that she was learning and details of some of the more intriguing aspects of the castle. She ate her meals on her own but without being pushed at a distance from her counterparts. No one here made it their business to tell her to move. They (more often than not) simply didn't register that she was there. She was finding the anonymity as soothing as she was finding it frustrating.

She really had convinced herself that she hadn't gotten her hopes up that things would change here, but she knew that she (on some level) must have let some of that hope get beyond her defenses. If she hadn't, then she wouldn't be finding herself so disappointed that she was still lonely.

She told herself that she really had it quite good here compared to before.

Her roommates didn't steal her stuff and hide it the way that the items in her backpack had always gone missing in primary. They even waited on her before going to breakfast some mornings. It was very thoughtful of them, and it was far more positive attention than she was used to receiving from anyone close to her age. The two of them talked and laughed, and she was too relieved to feel safe in their room to be bothered much by her lack of inclusion in the conversation. They noticed her letter writing and reckoned her homesick. They had even offered her reassuring words about getting used to the differences from time to time. They were nice to her in a detached sort of way, but they were not her friends.

Even if she had allowed that small smidgeon of hope that she would be less lonely here, she hadn't allowed herself to expect to have any of those. She had never had any before, and she wasn't sure that she would know what to do with one if one had suddenly appeared.

She told herself that she would get used to the kind of lonely that didn't have parents waiting for her at the end of the day. That didn't mean that she didn't feel the pangs when she watched her roommates giggle with their heads together in the common room or the boys from her year sitting in a circle playing Exploding Snap. It still hurt to be reminded that such things seemed to belong to a world that she was apparently destined to remain barred from forever.

She had always had a home with a bedroom away from prying eyes when things got to be too much for her before, but one of the drawbacks of having roommates was that enough time to get all of the crying out of your system when things got to be too much was a luxury that you did not get to have.

She ducked into a bathroom on the night of Halloween knowing that her roommates would forget soon enough that they had insisted she come down to see the decorations at the feast with them after she excused herself. Everyone else would be in the Great Hall, and she could have an hour or two to herself without anyone realizing where she was or what she was doing. Or, at least, that was what she had thought.

"You were crying." A voice startled her some time later.

Hermione blinked at the apparition in front of her. It was one of the castle ghosts entirely too far into her personal space for comfort. Hermione had seen them, of course, but none of them had ever addressed her directly before.

"I was just . . .," she started to explain.

"You were crying in the bathroom," the girl who appeared to have been only a few years older than herself when she had died stated as if it was an accusation. "You shouldn't, you know," the girl pouted. "It isn't enough that everyone makes fun of Myrtle. They have to copy her as well." The girl crossed her arms and retreated so that she was hovering next to one of the sink basins.

"I don't know what you mean," Hermione responded. She had just come to have a few minutes to cry on her own. She most certainly hadn't been making fun of anyone.

"They were teasing you, weren't they?" The girl (Hermione was assuming her name was Myrtle from her earlier comment) continued tilting her head to the side and looking at Hermione speculatively. All of the sudden her eyes darted back and forth as if she was looking for something. When she spoke again, it was in a whisper. "You shouldn't come here when they tease you. Bad things happen."

Something about the way the apparition said "bad things" sent a shiver down Hermione's spine. She didn't like it.

"No one was teasing me," Hermione insisted. "I just . . .," she let the words trail off as she shrugged her shoulders.

"Someone has teased you," Myrtle replied, "or you wouldn't be so defensive about it." Hermione didn't have an answer to that. She was quite out of practice at answering questions. "That's what I thought," Myrtle smiled. "You haven't any friends, have you?"

"That's hardly . . . ."

"I know what it looks like."

Hermione blinked at her.

"I didn't have any friends when I was here either," the apparition continued making it perfectly clear that she didn't care whether Hermione wanted to hear her story or not. "They teased me something dreadful. Couldn't take what they dished out though, could they?" Myrtle was nearly muttering to herself. "Having me restricted so they didn't have to remember what they had done." Her attention suddenly shifted back to the red rimmed eyed girl sharing the room with her. "What's your name?"

"Hermione."

"Myrtle. You know what it's like to be scared of them, don't you?" She didn't elaborate on who she meant by them, but Hermione didn't need her to explain. Memories of name calling and hair pulling and being shoved into mud puddles while someone tore her notebook to pieces came bubbling up to the surface. She bit her lip in an attempt to keep herself from resuming her earlier tears. She didn't want that to be her life here. It's why she had to keep quiet. It's why she had to keep them from seeing her. She found herself nodding in answer to Myrtle's question.

The sound of something dragging along the stone of the floor in the hallway filled the room. Myrtle's eyes temporarily widened before she looked at Hermione with something that might be considered a smirk across her translucent features. "Bad things," she repeated.

Hermione wasn't entirely sure what she was doing. She just knew that she was scared - the phrase frozen in fear that had peppered the pages of her books all of her life had suddenly become something real and tangible instead of words that conjured some vague idea. There had been something huge pushing itself through the doorway. Some place in the back of her mind had provided the designation "troll" to identify it. She didn't think she had screamed - she was so used to making sure that she didn't say anything at inopportune moments. It had simply been there, and she had had no idea what one was supposed to do when faced with such a creature.

She had been frightened and then she had hurt. The pain in her head was really the sort of thing that precluded all manner of deep thinking (or any thinking at all really). She couldn't see, and she hadn't known whether her eyes had actually been closed or whether the pain was so intense and throbbing about her temples that her vision had gone to black in response to it.

"Stay here, Hermione," she heard someone saying close beside her. "Do you hear me? Whatever happens, you remember that you want to _stay here_." There were other words, but she couldn't make any sense of them. The "stay here" echoed around her head bouncing off and in and around the pain while the blackness crept inward from her vision and took over everything.


	4. Founders (Helga)

Disclaimer: _Harry Potter_ does not belong to me.

Helga stirred the stew in front of her with half her attention focused on the preparations for the meal and half her attention on the problem keeping to her room two floors above her. She had always managed her best thinking in the kitchen, and she was desperately in need of some charity of thought now. She added another pinch of salt and let the repetitive motion of the spoon circling soothe the feelings of confusion and concern that were plaguing her. Letting her head clear could do nothing but help the situation.

Her daughter used to fuss at her back when she was at an age to be all for shortcuts and finishing day to day chores as quickly as possible. She used to insist that there was no need to expend the effort of manually completing chores like cooking when a simple wave of your wand could accomplish such things for you. She had always smiled and refrained from making the comment that rose to her lips each time - that she would understand the value someday. She knew the words would be wasted - they wouldn't mean anything to her until she actually got to that point.

Gitte had grown up to find her own quiet time for thinking in needlepoint of all things and no longer made exasperated comments to her mother about her cooking habits. Her middle child was a few weeks shy of delivering her own second child, but Helga wasn't sure that she would be able to be in attendance. She hated to miss the occasion, but she felt obligated to see things through here. She would need to remember to write her about the possibility. She might try to make time in the morning to do so.

There were many changes that would need to be made if Rowena did not improve soon. She had not emerged from her room since Helga had coaxed her out for a walk around the garden two days before the baby had arrived. She was barely picking at the food that Helga kept serving her. She was not just sad. She was not just weary. Helga had methods for those. Rowena was something else altogether. It was as if she was lost. Moreover, she seemed determined to do her level best to remain lost.

Helga had seen women who struggled to get their equilibrium back after the birth of a baby. She had a variety of means at her disposal that she used in those instances. Rowena, however, had been this way since before the baby had come.

The truth was that she didn't know how to help her friend. Helga may have spent more than half of her life as a widow, but everything she had thought she had known about the state was crumbling in the face of Rowena's determination to mire herself in her grief and allow it to overcome her. She had been in low spirits ever since Gareth's death. The four months since that event had seemed to bring no improvement. It felt like she was spiraling further and further into her closed little world that she was creating within the confines of the four walls of her bed chamber.

It had been Thom who had written to Helga asking her if she would come to serve as his mother's midwife. Rowena had tolerated her presence but whatever Thom had presumably hoped for about her arrival bringing back his mother's usual temperament had failed to come to fruition. Helga had been surprised at the state her friend was in - she had been less surprised at the way Rowena had sent most of the people around her packing.

Helga had hoped that the birth of her daughter would change that, but that did not seem to be occurring. Helena was nine days old, and Rowena only seemed to be getting worse. Her friend hadn't even chosen her child's name. Thom had chosen the name for his new sister when Rowena had dismissed the suggestion that she choose something with an agitated "call her what you will." Thom had been taken aback, but he had done as bid and chosen a variation on a name from an epic poem he was in the midst of working on a translation for - Thom's academic inclinations had taken a decidedly less theoretical bent than either of his parents. Thom had done his best to talk his mother around, but Rowena showed no inclination to listen to him. He was missing his father as well, but he was twenty five and not of a temperament to miss out on the present for the sake of the past. He had gone back home three days ago (even though his wife had told him that he should stay with his mother so long as she needed him).

Thom had been a contented baby; Helena was anything but. Helga was convinced that had far more to do with Rowena than it did with the little girl's natural temperament. Babies were sensitive creatures; they were dependent on the adults around them for care, and Helga felt that made them rather good readers of human nature. As long as Rowena was distressed, then Helena was going to be distressed in turn (and on and on the cycle would continue until Rowena - being the adult and the one in a position to make actual choices - made an effort to break it).

As it was, Rowena had refused to see the girl entirely on this day - leaving her to the care of the wet nurse and what attention Helga could offer her in between the other tasks she was undertaking trying to keep the household running. She was out of ideas. She had received word that Godric was on his way, and she hoped that he would be able to talk his sister-in-law into some semblance of normalcy. She couldn't be sure that that would work. Rowena was so apt to take things amiss these days. Not to mention that she was developing a dreadfully imperious habit of refusing to see anyone that interrupted her brooding. Godric, however, was a force of nature all on his own. Rowena would find it far more difficult to send him packing than she had nearly everyone else. She hadn't tried to make Helga go away. As out of it as she was, she still seemed aware enough to know that trying to make Helga leave would be a battle that she would not win.

Helga could out stubborn almost anyone, but stubborn couldn't accomplish everything. In truth, Rowena's actions were so foreign to her that she struggled for the right words and actions in response.

She had been married at twelve. She had borne three children and become a widow by her seventeenth birthday. She had mourned for Hugh, but it had never occurred to her to shut herself up and cease to function. She had kept living. There had been three little ones depending on her. Further, in her world, death had always been considered a part of life. Death simply was. It was the natural progression of life for all things and people to die, and her family had always taught their children to accept it as such when it was time.

For Rowena, death had been a problem that she had failed to solve.

Godric's visit had the potential to turn unpleasant, and this house had seen enough unpleasantness over the last few weeks to last for anyone's lifetime. She had actually encouraged Thom to leave - which was something that she normally never would have dreamed of doing. The boy . . . man she reminded herself (he was a grown man with a child of his own) . . . had been so twisted around by his inability to get through to his mother that it was doing him more harm than good to try to help. As it didn't seem to be helping Rowena any to have her son with her, there was no purpose to his remaining. He had asked if he should take Helena with him, and Helga wasn't sure she had done the right thing asking him to leave his sister behind. Consigning the infant to her brother's care smacked of finality. Helga might have been at an end of ideas, but she was not yet ready to make such a concession.

She was failing a friend that needed her, and that was something that Helga could not simply allow to stand. She would stay and fight what battles she could until Rowena was ready again to fight constructive battles for herself.

Godric was coming and that gave her an ally if nothing else.


	5. (Founders) Godric

Disclaimer: _Harry Potter_ does not belong to me.

Godric son of Griffin the Silversmith had not intended to have an adventurous life.

His plans during his childhood had revolved around learning his father's trade. He had thought he might set his mind to refining it a bit - thinking of some better way of completing the tasks perhaps, but his mind had been very much focused on where and when he was. It was Gareth that had the aspirations beyond what they had always known. His elder brother had been a collector from Godric's earliest memories. He craved the stories that might be brought by a passing traveler the way other children craved the attention of their mother.

It was by accident that Godric discovered that he had a natural affinity for the protective arts. It was nature that made him lacking in inclination to refuse his assistance when it was requested. He had been raised by parents that held to the principle that gifts were granted to be used, so he found himself spending his youth traipsing around with Gareth searching out those in need of aide as well as those in need of challenge. The lion and the raven were the names by which the smallfolk referred to them in their tales around the fire.

Gareth gathered knowledge of what was needed, and Godric pounced when the time was right (as if any of the people telling the tales even knew what it might look like when a lion pounced, but the cruelties of the entertainments of Rome were still well enough remembered). It had taken rather a while before he stopped resenting the implications (intended or not) of the comparison.

Gareth had married the only child of a family that had both the means and the inclination to make the collection of manuscripts of a variety of origins their pastime of choice. He lost his desire to travel somewhere along the way. He was pleased to have knowledge come to him instead of being forced to go out in pursuit of knowledge, and Rowena had been all too pleased to spend her days finding the practical applications for his theoretical suppositions. There had still been some collaboration in those early days, and the Raven's Claw (as they dubbed his brother's bride) had her fair share of time in the stories.

Godric, on the other hand, had found that travel suited him, and the girl who had followed Rowena to her new husband's home as companion and maidservant was as content to allow him his wanderings as she had been to accept his proposals. Elise was a treasure beyond any other he had found, and he would be pleased to be home with her again once he completed his task at his brother's widow's home. He would be glad to put his wanderings to the side for a time to enjoy his wife and children.

That, in any case, had been the plan. As was often the case in his experience, the plan did not come to fruition as expected. Rowena was proving to be far more difficult to deal with than he had allowed for in his calculations (which was, perhaps, why he was so often encouraged not to try to predict other people's actions as part of his calculations).

Godric is not particularly good at being soothing. This is something that he knows. His banishment from his wife's side when she was bedridden before the birth of their fourth is a testament to that. He would prefer to forget, but she likes to use it as a reminder of why their children prefer to do their crying on her shoulder. In his defense in this particular instance, he never expected to need to do any soothing of his sister-in-law.

Rowena has always been rather self-contained. She values knowledge and logic. One would think that such a woman would not sink so in the face of troubles. He does not know what it is like to be severed from one's spouse (prefers not to think of it truly), but the picture of what his Elise would have to say if he ever just brushed off their children over missing her is enough to reassure himself that it is not a danger for him.

Rowena is moping, but that is being hidden behind her claim of mourning. He did not know Salazar at the time that his wife died, but he obviously did not shut himself away in consequence. He had known Helga quite well at the time of her widowing. (Widowing? Was that the appropriate word? He could not say for certain.) Helga had behaved nothing like this. Helga had done her mourning without making a scene. She had cared for her children. Really, she had cared for everyone that had come across her path.

That was Helga. Given that as a provision for comparison then, should not Rowena have locked herself in her study or the library as opposed to her bedchamber? It may be that she would need the news he was bearing as much as he needed her assistance in order to make it a reality. Helga, he had perhaps unwisely, counted on for support - she had oft enough expressed that such a thing was desperately needed. Rowena he had hoped to entice with the promise of the dissemination of knowledge, but there was no hope of enticing someone who refused to hear you speak.

It was all quite frustrating.

This was an idea that would require collaboration to make a reality, and he was starting to be concerned that it would be scuttled before it even got a proper beginning by his inability to figure out how to deal with his recalcitrant sister-in-law. That would be deeply disappointing, and he resolved that Rowena was going to hear him out whether she liked or no. It was not only about the possibility of a school. Something was needed to snap her out of her melancholia, and it needed to happen soon.


	6. Founders (Rowena)

Disclaimer: _Harry Potter_ is not mine.

Thom had finally been persuaded to take himself off home. It had not come a moment too soon as she was really quite out of tolerance for all of his attempts at trying to manage her. She supposed she had Helga to thank for his departure, but as she also had Helga to thank for the wet nurse's continued attempts to get her to summon some interest in the mewling, fretful bundle that was being presented to her on a daily basis, she felt no guilt at failing to voice that gratitude. That was Helga's less direct attempt at managing her. She had just as little tolerance for it coming from her friend as from her son, but there was quite literally no one who would be convincing Helga to leave aside from Helga herself. In truth, she had little objection to Helga staying. Helga could stay below stairs and manage the house to her heart's content. She just needed to stop her attempts at advocating for the resident of the nursery.

She did not appreciate the reproachful looks that were forever being leveled in her direction - from Helga and Thom and even members of the household staff whenever she refused to play along with their scheming. There was no reason for them to look so put out with her; it was not as though she wished the child ill.

The nurse seemed to be healthy enough, and she well knew that Helga would not tolerate an incompetent being left to manage a child. Thus, the child's basic care was assured. (Rowena would have made some sort of arrangements if that had not been the case.) The child was fed and clothed, and she had no further concerns about the situation. She simply had no desire to see the babe - let alone hold or cosset her. Why was that so difficult for any of them to understand? They all knew families in which that was the standard procedure for the lady of the house. She did not know why they all insisted on explanations and trying to talk her around to their preferences. It was no concern of theirs. She hardly needed their reminders that this was far different than the practices of the house when Thom had been born; her memory was sufficient to provide her with all of the details to contrast that she could ever possibly need. Did they all suffer from the delusion that it would be the same without her husband in the midst?

Gareth had been a doting figure front and center in all of her interactions with their infant eldest. She had no stomach for repeating the motions with no husband and father present for this their second and last. It was not the same, and she was not about to pretend that it was. Nothing was ever going to be the same again. She was never going to be the same again.

She wanted to be left alone - to what purpose she did not yet know. How could she when she was no longer even certain what she was? She had been called the Raven's Claw by the spreaders of stories - what would they call her with no Raven by her side? She was not certain that she wanted to know and not wanting to know was such a foreign concept to her that she felt as if she no longer fit inside her own skin.

She was glad to have Thom gone, but she was disappointed that his last words to her had been an admission that Godric was on his way. She could, she supposed, simply refuse to see him, but she suspected that would only work for a limited amount of time. That was an endlessly aggravating prospect - this was her home after all. She was mistress here, and if she wanted to refuse visitors, then that ought to be her right. She just wanted solitude. It should be granted to her.

Quiet was doing the turmoil inside her head no favors, but it was a sight better than the expectations inherent in people watching you every moment of every day. She had succeeded in sending nearly everyone in the house away (the servants mostly packed off to new positions arranged elsewhere). Helga, of course, would not have gone no matter what she ordered, but she had already admitted that she did not mind if the other woman stayed. In part, that was due to the selfish knowledge that she could stay shut up in her bedchamber for as long as she liked with the other woman present. Helga would manage whatever might be in need of managing. (Helga, after all, dearly loved to manage.)

In part, she found that she wanted the other woman close. She could not begin to say why. The other woman practically radiated contentment wherever she went, and Rowena was in no humor to be tolerant of those who were content. Under other circumstances, she might have found the inconsistency of it intriguing (these were not other circumstances, so she did not bother to examine them as she might have once). Her desire for the other woman's presence was certainly not caused by any sort of companionableness of widowhood either.

Rowena may have married early in accordance with generally accepted practice, but she had married a relatively young man (particularly by wizarding standards). She had not been Helga - married off to a man of an age nearly twice doubled. She and Gareth had been meant to age together - there was none of Helga's death is to be expected as part of life philosophy in her world. She was not supposed to be facing such a stretch of years without him. She should not be facing such a stretch of years without him. Of what use was magic if it did not provide answers when they were needed? Of what use was she if all her skill and knowledge failed her when she needed them most?

She did not know. There were many things now that she did not know. She also no longer knew whether she cared to find out.


	7. Founders (Salazar)

Disclaimer: I do not own _Harry Potter_.

Salazar had been called a great many things in his life, and he would be the first to admit that more often than not the names were warranted. He had even (a time or thrice) been called a fool, and there were stories from his past that would, in hindsight, qualify for a description of foolhardy. All that aside, he was not now nor had he ever been enough of a fool as to decline a place at Helga's table when such an opportunity arose. He was unclear as to why his friend had approached him first - a part of him suspected that he had wanted reassurance that his ideas were at least plausible before he presented them to someone that was more likely to dissect them for flaws than embrace the concept. (He had deemed them plausible himself, but he had refused to reassure Godric of their practicality. The man should have started with Helga in his opinion. She, after all, had been pointing out the need for as long as she had been known to him.) He had been abandoned while his friend pursued an audience with his sister-in-law, but it was difficult to feel truly abandoned when one was left to the care of a bustling figure determined to feed him. (In truth, he wanted nothing to do with what was likely to be an unpleasant interview unfolding above stairs and was well-satisfied to keep to the warmth and comfort of the kitchen.)

He took his place with a murmur of thanks and spent a long moment inhaling the scent of the stew she placed in the trencher in front of him. It was an overly expressive response, perhaps, but one which he felt that the occasion legitimately warranted - it had, after all, been so long since he had last enjoyed this particular pleasure that the time frame was measured in years. There was nothing complicated about the offering, but the smell alone made him feel as if years of worry were sliding off of his shoulders. He breathed in more deeply.

He had seen a great deal of magic in his day (and a few things that could only be termed wondrous during the years that he had taken to traveling with Godric). He had never, however, seen anything that conjured quite the same sense of being in the presence of genius as the mastery with which the woman in front of him commanded a kitchen. He was perfectly willing to admit that his viewpoint might be biased by the fact that he only enjoyed Helga's hospitality on rare occasions - generally toward the end of one of his and Godric's rambles when one or both of them needed to be mended of something or other. At those times, both of them had generally been subsisting on more burnt than not items of questionable origin singed over a campfire alternating with what was more grease than anything else that often passed for soup in one of the inns that catered to those too travel weary and hungry to pay the lack of quality any mind.

Biased view or not, Helga was still a marvelous cook (and the truth was that he did not eat much better when he was at home than he did when he was on the road with Godric). He would take what he could get while he could get it. The blessed woman must have read his mind as she placed a loaf of bread and a crock of butter to his side. He did not know how long Godric's errand would take or even if he had a moderate chance of success. He had misgivings enough about the idea himself, but he found himself thinking that if Rowena did agree, then Helga was likely easily persuadable to the plan.

That part he could get behind - he wondered if there was any way of asking what Godric's plans entailed when it came to keeping them all fed that would not sound rude or completely self-serving. He heard her chuckling at him and made an effort to slow down the speed with which he was shoveling the contents of the trencher into his mouth.

"How long since you have had a proper meal this time?" She asked. He shrugged his shoulders and kept eating as his reply. She clucked her tongue at him and poured out another ladle from over his shoulder. "Slow down before you choke," she admonished.

He let his mind drift as he chewed at a more reasonable pace.

He had been . . . less than pleased by the development that had arisen on his last visit to his sister's household. He understands very well that he is not a prominent fixture in the lives of his children. He had left their early care far too much in the hands of others for it to be either fair or reasonable for him to resent that the girls both kept a certain level of distance. He would not class such a thing as a regret - he knew that he would not have done best by them at the time as things were, but he could say with all the benefits of hindsight and hard thrust upon him maturity that he would not make the same choice if in similar circumstances now. (Easily said, he knew, as he had no intention of ever again being in a situation that could lead to those circumstances.) The girls had passed their childhood under the care of their aunt with intermittent flying visits between his travels. They had been happy children, and he had been a content traveler. Their adolescence had seen him more readily available to them, but that was a time when a trusted female confidant must be considered a more valued necessity than indulging an oft missing and rather distant father.

Wizards might tend to longer lives than their muggle counterparts, but the prevailing tradition towards young marriages stood even among his compatriots. It was not uncommon for a family aligning betrothal to be requested for a daughter at seven or eight (some families began maneuvering at the first confirmation of magic). He had not been entirely surprised when he had been approached when the girls were twelve. He had declined the negotiation with a certain amount of civility (his original curt reply had been revised by his sister). He saw no need to rush these things - and he had no need of (or desire to) playing the never ending games in the politicking world of those who considered themselves the nobility of wizarding society. His daughter making the request was a different matter entirely than dealing with a request from outsiders. He had, in truth, been entirely unprepared for such a thing.

He was less than pleased, but he would not stand in the way of this particular choice. His youngest would be married before autumn. Perhaps, this plan of building a school would provide an opportunity for his eldest to come and spend an extended visit with him. In any case, it would provide a compelling distraction from his distaste at his soon to be cemented new family alliance.


	8. Hurt Lingers (Petunia and Lily)

Disclaimer: _Harry Potter_ does not belong to me.

"Must you always suck all of the attention out of a room?" Petunia bit out as she dropped the stack of dishes in her hands into the sink in front of her with altogether more force than was necessary.

Lily sighed but chose not to engage. The conversation she had just held with the members of her family was a serious one that really should not have been put off any longer. She was sorry that Petunia had felt as if she was trying to one up her. Petunia, however, was liable to take offense no matter what was done or how it was handled, so she was not sure what she should have done differently. Her parents needed protection. Her sister needed protection. The sooner the news was out in the open, the sooner that they could get Petunia's arguments out of the way and get on with making the arrangements. It was not her fault that Petunia had been at their parents' home to make an announcement of her own when she and James had arrived. There were priorities here, and she was not about to let her parents be murdered for lack of a series of protective enchantments just because Petunia was getting into a fit of temper over the lack of excitement for her new house. She took a deep breath and tried to arrange her words as carefully as possible - already knowing that the expression on her older sister's face indicated that she was going to have little to no luck in her endeavor.

"It's great that you and Vernon have made this purchase," she volleyed first as a sort of a peace offering. "It will make the protections much easier than at that place you were renting."

She might as well have slapped her sister across the face to produce the look that was immediately thrown in her direction.

"Protections?" Petunia hissed at her. "Protections? You aren't coming anywhere near my new home with any of your freakish meddling." Her sister started the hot water flowing from the tap and began rummaging under the sink for the dish soap.

"You know I could just . . .," she started before cutting herself off as she realized she had made another misstep.

Petunia began scrubbing away at the first dish she could reach as if her life depended on it. Lily thought her sister's shoulders were shaking but she could not say whether it was out of upset or rage.

"I'm perfectly capable of washing dishes, Lily, even if I haven't got your talents," she spat making the word sound as if it was a curse.

"Tuney, please, let's just talk about this."

"I said no."

Lily retreated to the other room to continue to make plans with her parents. She would have to work on her sister after she had calmed down a bit. James tilted his head in question, but she merely shook hers in response before explaining to her mother that Petunia had volunteered to wash up the dishes so that they could have a chance to explain more of the details. Her mother had made some comment about that being not necessary before getting distracted by James's attempt to explain how some of the most basic protection spells worked, but her father had raised an eyebrow at her over her mother's head. He knew that something else had been said in that kitchen - he always did. Lily shook her head slightly and the eyebrow rose a fraction further before he allowed himself to be drawn into the conversation. Vernon had settled himself firmly apart from the rest of them and refused to be included in any part of the discussion. The evening clearly could have gone better.

She tried one last time before everyone departed. She had halted her sister outside the front door. Vernon was already waiting in their car, and James had been waved back inside the house. Petunia had done everything short of bolting down the walk to get away from her.

"Do you really have nothing else to say to me?" She asked as she tried to think of anything she could say to try to get this conversation back on track.

"Nothing."

"I don't understand you, Petunia."

"You don't understand me?" The snorting sound that her sister made was derisive in the extreme. "I'm not the one running around entangling myself in unnatural things."

"You were my best friend, Pet." She tried one last appeal at nostalgia.

"Hardly," she dismissed, "even if that were so, it didn't take much for you to replace me, did it?"

"Is that what this is about?" Lily demanded feeling the fragile hold she was keeping on her temper start to slip away from her. "Petty jealousy?"

"Jealousy?" Petunia sound incredulous. "You've just told Mum and Dad that you've decided to run off and elope because there's some sort of a war on and you think you might get yourself killed before you get the chance to plan things properly."

"That's not what I said."

"It's what you meant." Her sister replied. For one brief moment, they could have been little girls again while her older sister gave her that look that had always followed those moments when Lily had tried and failed to make up some explanation for one of the things that was always happening around her that neither they nor their parents could understand. It was that look that had always said quite clearly that she was not buying Lily's attempts to talk her away around whatever it was - the one that said she was disappointed in her for not trusting her sister enough to just say flat out whatever it was that had happened. It pulled at her heart as she remembered that look being followed by hugs and whispered words that it would all be alright coming from the older sister that had promised that she would always help her - the one who had always made things better until each year older and each new set of incidents had pushed them further and further apart as Lily drifted further into the world of things that Petunia couldn't do and Petunia determinedly settled herself further back into the world where Lily couldn't make herself fit.

Lily tried to pause and take a breath before she continued. She did not want this conversation to end in stomping off sisters and ever more angry words the way so many others went. She could not even deny that there was a grain of truth in what Petunia had just said. She and James might get killed in the course of the coming events. They were, more than likely, accelerating their plans because they both knew that was the case. They were not unaware of the dangers or making light of them. That's why she so desperately needed her family to agree to these protections. She needed to keep them safe. Petunia still knew her well enough to read between the lines. That had to count for something. She had to listen. Otherwise, Lily didn't know what she would do. Tonight, however, the time for willingness to listen had clearly passed. She would give her time to cool down and think things over. Then, she would try again. She would just have to keep trying (and hope that there was enough time left for her trying to have some effect).


End file.
